Introducing TurboVote

TurboVote FAQs:

• What is TurboVote?
  TurboVote is a tool that makes it easy to vote and register from home. We offer all the information you need to get registered or vote by mail, and we send you text and email reminders so you don’t miss elections.

• Why should I sign up?
  Do you like voting? Wouldn’t you like to vote more often? TurboVote makes voting easier, so you can spend your time thinking about the candidates and issues—and we help make sure you never miss elections.

• Am I really allowed to vote from home?
  In 30 states and the District of Columbia, anyone can request a mail-in ballot, for any reason—and every state allows commuters, college students, and others with valid excuses to vote absentee. Please sign up to learn more about your state’s rules.

• How does TurboVote let me register and vote from home?
  We send you a completed ballot request form for your state and an addressed, postage-paid envelope. When your request form arrives, simply sign it and put it in the mail. Your local election board will receive the request and send you a ballot.  And if you are not registered, TurboVote can send you a completed voter registration form and postage-paid envelope.

• But I like my polling place!
  Really? Okay, we believe you. Mostly. And we like the little “I voted” stickers ourselves. We’ll still provide you with reminders about upcoming elections so the big school board race doesn’t ever slip your mind.

• How do reminders work?
  For every election—local, federal, special, primary and general—TurboVote sends timely text message or email reminders to ensure that you can request an absentee ballot on time and never miss the date to mail in your ballot. And of course we also offer reminders for everyone still voting in person at their polling location.

• Do I have to pay for TurboVote?
  Reminders are free, and it doesn’t cost anything to use our site to generate absentee ballot and voter registration forms for you to print and send in yourself.  Mailing completed forms with a pre-stamped envelope costs us exactly $1.15 in printing and stamps. TurboVote partners with colleges, universities, and 501(c)(3) organizations to offer this service to their students or members, but we aren’t able to mail forms to individual users yet. If you are a student and would like to bring TurboVote to your campus, please contact us.

• Can my university or organization offer TurboVote to all our members?
  Right now, TurboVote only partners with colleges and nonprofits, but we would like to open our service to other community organizations. If you would like to work with us in the future, please contact us.

• What if I just want more information about registering and voting absentee?
  We recommend you check out Long Distance Voter.

• Who funds TurboVote?
  The Knight Foundation, Google, Sunlight Foundation, and Youth Engagement Fund have all offered grants to help build TurboVote, and our early support came from individual donors on Kickstarter.

• Is TurboVote nonpartisan?
  Yes! TurboVote helps all Americans vote. TurboVote is a service provided by Democracy Works, Inc., a nonpartisan, nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization devoted to improving civic engagement through the use of technology.

• Who is TurboVote?
  TurboVote is a project by the nonprofit Democracy Works, Inc. For more on our team, see the about page.

• Why are you doing this?
  We believe that if voting was more convenient, more people would vote; and if more people voted, we could reinvigorate local and primary elections, politicians would be held more accountable, our leadership would be more representative, and our democracy would work better.

More about TurboVote:

Read a recent article about TurboVote in The Chronicle of Higher Education:
Online Service Works With Colleges to Get Students Registered to Vote
For info about bringing TurboVote to your campus you can email sam@turbovote.org or call us at (646) 580-VOTE [8683].

At least four American Democracy Project campuses are currently using TurboVote:

1. Eastern Michigan University
2. University of Michigan – Dearborn
3. University of North Carolina at Charlotte
4. Wayne State University

You can follow TurboVote on Twitter (@turbovote) and “like” them on Facebook.

You’ll find additional information on TurboVote here and here.

For info about bringing TurboVote to your campus you can email sam@turbovote.org or call us at (646) 580-VOTE [8683].